Scott Mitchell -- the thinner one who set all those Lions passing records on some pretty good teams in the mid-1990s, not the fat guy on that Biggest Loser TV show -- might have been onto something when he said, quite frequently actually: "Detroit football fans are funny."
He said it without humor because he didn't really mean funny the way most of us do. If he were to speak his mind, he might have described those fans as weird. Perhaps even pathetic. And who could argue the way fans seemed fixated on his "happy feet" while he was lighting up other teams' defenses throwing to Herman Moore, Brett Perriman and Johnnie Morton -- and winning football games?
Seems like those naysayers are back in full force. Their team is 11-4, has a reservation in the NFL's Super Bowl tournament, and all they can talk about is how poorly the Lions played in a 20-14 victory at Chicago last Sunday. Their fourth straight victory, mind you. Three of them in December.
Seriously? That's all you've got with a one-game, winner-take-all showdown for a division title at Green Bay Sunday? You'd rather be talking about what Detroit fans typically talk about this time of year? The NFL draft? It's still more than four months away -- but it's a big topic of conversation in a lot of cities around the league already.
Here? Not much love for a team that rebounded beyond the wildest expectations under first-year coach Jim Caldwell after years of ineptitude that went beyond futility and bordered on shameful for the way it represented this city.
For that alone, Caldwell should be the league's runaway Coach of the Year winner.
For the way he more-than-gently defended his quarterback, Matthew Stafford, against the vitriol emanating from the sports-talk airwaves and the Twitter-sphere, Caldwell surely earned even more respect from the 53 men in the Lions' locker room.
"First of all, I think there is a lack of appreciation for him around here I think at times," Caldwell said Monday. "Let me just tell you something: He's a man's man. He's a tough guy. He gets hit out there every single ball game, he hangs in there. And there may be one (errant pass) he'd like to have back, but then there's a couple others that's probably not all his fault."
Stafford, like every player on the roster, is graded on his entire body of work, not just a couple of plays that knock a few fans off their couches.
"He also did a lot of great things for us," Caldwell said of Stafford. "I'll tell you what, he's progressing, I'm proud of the way that guy is playing, and I think also you're going to see him get better and better."
Fans will take that, of course. But they should understand they're witnessing something special with a still-maturing quarterback learning a new offense this season. His quarterback rating might have been less than sterling, but he threw for 243 yards against the Bears that put him at 4,040 for the season. That's his fourth straight career 4,000-yard season. By doing so, he joins Peyton Manning (with five) and Hall of Famer Dan Marino (four) as the only passers in NFL history with four 4,000-yard seasons in their first six years in the league.
There's more. In his six seasons, Stafford has led the Lions to 17 wins when the team trailed or the game was tied in the fourth quarter or in overtime. Five of those comebacks have come this season, which leads the league.
Yet none of it seems to matter. A team that most thought would be closer to 4-11 this season than 11-4 can't seem to buy a little respect from fans jaded by decades of losing and losing badly.
Here in Detroit, the fan base seems to be obsessing about how this team has no chance in the playoffs because of its offensive inconsistencies rather than daring to get a little excited just to be able to see their team play a game in January for a change.
Yet Caldwell, who can almost always find a way to say something nice, confessed his frequent encounters with fans have always been enlightening and upbeat.
"Actually they've been great," Caldwell said. "There's something that probably should be said: I could tell a lot about the fan base when I first arrived here. I could tell that it was a fan base that had intensity, had a great love for the team, great sports town, great interest in what was taking place here, and certainly were just starving for a team to be able to play in a way I think represents this entire area.
"People have an interest in what we do," he added. "They're excited about it, I know that."
Is it just me, or does that sound a bit like the skinny Scott Mitchell?
